Aromantic Narratives and Creativity
As I post weekly pride patch patterns on Patreon, here’s a monthly round-up for non-subscribers!
Folks who need help with materials, stitching, finishing or attaching patches should check out my tutorial master page.
Previous patterns are available at my pattern gallery.
As I post weekly pride patch patterns on Patreon, here’s a monthly round-up for non-subscribers!
Folks who need help with materials, stitching, finishing or attaching patches should check out my tutorial master page.
Previous patterns are available at my pattern gallery.
As I now post weekly pride patch patterns on Patreon, I thought non-subscribers may appreciate a monthly round-up!
Folks who need help with materials, stitching, finishing or attaching patches should check out my tutorial master page.
Previous patterns are available at my pattern gallery.
I thought I’d continue the Pride Month theme by expanding my library of patterns to encompass non-aromantic identities. Alas, this isn’t a fully-inclusive collection! Many identities require letters not yet designed, as I’ve completed only one of my patch pattern alphabets. While today’s patterns do use some new or modified letters, time constraints meant that I chose identities with simpler-for-me names.
Additional queer, polysexual, asexual and bisexual text patch patterns–along with a lower-case alphabet that can be adapted to any horizontal, five-striped pride flag–are available at my patch pattern gallery. Folks wishing “genderfluid” or “omnisexual” patches can use this alphabet to create their own patterns by following my tutorial. I also have several aromantic-spectrum text patterns, many of which can be adapted for asexual spectrum identities.
Folks who need help with materials, stitching, finishing or attaching patches should check out last week’s pride text tutorial and my tutorial master page.
In my days of chronic pain and familial interruption, I found patch patterns easiest to create. I started by sharing a handful of new and expanded/variant pattens with my Patreon supporters … and then, on a bit of a Photoshop roll, reworked some of my older patterns with needed letter-shape and template changes.
(I created my original lower-case “aro” pattern before a complete lower-case flag-stripe alphabet with standardised letter width. Inconsistencies between old pattern and new alphabet, though, make it difficult to use said pattern as a base for custom lower-case text. Time for an update!)
Due to pain limitations, I again offer a collection of cross stitch text patterns without stitched examples. Folks wishing to stitch the “abro”, “aro”, “alloaro” and “aroace” patterns can find finished examples on parts one and two of my text patch miniseries, but please expect slight differences from the updated designs.
All previous patterns are available at my new pattern gallery. Folks who need help with materials, stitching, finishing or attaching patches should check out my tutorial master page.
I have patterns I created for testing my new pattern template, patches I made but didn’t post about, patches I sewed onto my pride patch jacket but missed out on becoming tutorials, and patches discussed in previous tutorials that I mean to make for myself. It felt like time to make a post!
Folks who wish to find all my text patterns without having to scroll through tutorials and explanations can do so on my new text patch master page. Patterns are listed in alphabetical order (with my alphabet patterns at the end), while all sub-headers link to the tutorial posts featuring said pattern.
Please note that this post does not include photos of the other patches. They either don’t yet exist or were made as gifts by someone who forgot to first take a photo…
Continue reading “Pride Patch Patterns: Aro (and Not Aro) Text”
A chronic pain flare in January (extending into February) seriously disrupted my Aro Week content plans. In my scramble to change direction, I decided to replace one of my ideas with something fun: an image series of oft-spoken comments using my pixel-art alphabet. This post includes an absurd mix of positivity, identity labels and passive-aggressive expressions of aro frustration, because why not?
(Also, frogs!)
It should be noted that not all slogans will represent all aros. I’ve simply collected a list of common aro-community feelings and expressions, both as statements of pride and responses to aro microaggressions.
So if you want to 
and celebrate some 
this week, you’ll find a variety of options below:
A princess flees her betrothed in search of a witch willing to entrap her within a tower. Rowan yearns to be out and proud as an aromantic, but other people’s misapprehensions—and his own anxiety—hamper his quest. A woman expresses her wish for unfettered sexual intimacy, despite her mother’s desperate romantic expectations. For another pansexual, the route to freedom from amatonormativity lies in accepting monstrosity’s fur and fangs. Suki finds aromantic freedom inside the priesthood’s cloisters, but even a rebellious life leaves her at a loss when ministering to her own. And the words “allosexual aromantic” offer a struggling magician hope of a new road—but one not without its dangers.
Bones of Green and Hearts of Gold collects twenty fantasy and contemporary stories celebrating the many ways aromanticism need not always pair with asexuality.
Since I took an updated patch collection photo for the tutorial master page, I thought I’d post some spoilers for new patch designs.
I wanted to make letter “A” patches, in part because many of my identities start with said letter and in part because it’s still common to see “A” associated only or first with asexual in the parlance of LGBTQIA+ initials. Nor did I want to remake the same style of patch in different colours and stripe variations, so, using a few extant patterns and typefaces as inspiration, I experimented with different upper and lower case “A”s:
I don’t own any pride merch, aside from a small rainbow-striped flag that sits on my desk, that isn’t handmade. Most pride merch items can only be purchased online, and even if shipping to or within Australia weren’t prohibitively expensive, I still don’t have money to spend on optional extras.
As shown on my about page, I’ve made beaded fidget toys, simple jewellery, aro pride dresses for Sylvanian Families figurines and a journal cover made from washi tape. I’ve spent a few years pondering the making of pride flag patches, as in something I could theoretically accomplish should I find enough absence of pain and motivation. As I’d gotten back into hand sewing (mostly in making clothing for my Lori dolls) this year, it seemed like a good time to try!
Continue reading “Craft Collection: Aro Cross-Stitch Patches”
Aro Worlds 